“I Love to Tell the Story” has always been a favorite of mine.  The story to this wonderful hymn can be found at cyberhymnal.org. This particular hymn came from a rather long poem.  The first part of the poem contained at least fifty stanzas!

I’m sharing a free congregational piano arrangement of “I Love to Tell the Story” for the advanced church pianist.  This free arrangement contains a lot of full chords which is necessary for supporting congregational singing.

I apologize for not posting as often but circumstances haven’t allowed me to do so.  I always hearing from my readers. Thanks so much for your encouragement!  I love to hear how the site has been a help to you.  That’s what keeps me going 🙂

Click here to download free piano arrangement of “I Love to Tell the Story” page one

I will post the remainder of this arrangement as soon as possible.

I Love to Tell the Story page two

Just discovered another website for church pianists from other online friends. Introducing…Glorious Assurance Music…a fairly new online resource for church pianists.

Two sisters, Laurie Iskat and Christie Funchess, began this website in the fall of 2010.  Their desire was to provide a resource for God-honoring  Christian music.

The arrangements range from beginner to advanced. At this time, they are offering three free arrangements (listed below). The rest of the arrangements are available for sale at a very reasonable price.

“I Will Sing of the Mercies of the Lord” peppy piano duet (late intermediate to early adv)

“Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus”  piano solo (late intermediate to early adv)

“How Sweet it Is”  uplifting chorus (for church use, ladies’ meetings or children’s choir)

I look forward to shopping at this resourceful site for church pianists.

The words to “Come Thou Fount” were penned by a preacher named Robert Robinson in 1758.  He wrote this song several years after coming to know Christ.

Robert was prone to wander like all of us as revealed in the words “…prone to wander Lord I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love;” But then his request of  renewed devotion “Here’s my heart, O take and seal it, Seal it for Thy courts above.”

For those that have wondered about the meaning of “Ebenezer” in verse two….”Here I raise mine Ebenezer…”   Ebenezer means “stone of help”.

Click on song title below to download a free ladies’ two part acapella arrangement. I’ve offered the arrangement in two different keys.

Come Thou Fount (ladies’ two part) *acapella arrangement in B flat (lower key)

Come Thou Fount (ladies’ two part) *acapella arrangement  in C Major

As promised….here’s a free piano arrangement of “The Old Rugged Cross”.  I wrote it in memory of Letha Snodgrass, my piano student and friend. Sorry I didn’t post this sooner for those who would have used it for Easter. I just haven’t been in the writing mood lately until now.

Click on this link to download: The Old Rugged Cross

Audio of The Old Rugged Cross:

Audio of The Old Rugged Cross:  

This has been a very difficult week.  One of my piano students I’ve been mentoring to be a church pianist passed away this week…very unexpectedly.  Please pray for the family.

I’ve managed to prepare a “free accompaniment” idea for Heaven Came Down.  This particular hymn contains a mundane bass line..making it a challenge for the average church pianist to create an interesting accompaniment.  What to do?  You have to play what’s not there 🙂  Easy said…but a challenge to do right?  For that reason, I’m sharing a free accompaniment idea that can be used for the verse of this hymn.

I”m limited on what I can share because this hymn is still under copyright. Therefore, I can only share a small portion for educational purposes only…(called the “fair use” law). Just use the same accompaniment idea to finish out the verse.  I would tend to use this accompaniment idea ONLY if the congregation is secure with their voice parts…whatever that may be.  Most of our congregation sings melody.

Click here to download Heaven-Came-Down-congregational-idea

I know I’ve shared free arrangements of “Just As I Am” prior to this…but wanted to share a longer arrangement of it this time.  I’m feverishly working on a “congregational” accompaniment book for the pianists at our church.  If all goes well…I will offer it  on my site once I acquire a  generous collection of hymns.

Our church pianists have enjoyed using the “working” copy of this book. They like the pre-made introductions…especially for those awkward entry hymns that require “special treatment” for a comfortable introduction.  The song leader has also commented on it making his job easier.

Without further introduction…here’s your free piano arrangement of “Just As I Am”

Click on the above title in “red” for the arrangement

Special note: I haven’t included an introduction to this arrangement yet because we mainly use background music for invitation. I may consider modulating for some of the other invitation hymns in this book.

Another special note:  This particular arrangement is not included in the first congregational collection but a more elaborate arrangement of Just As I Am is included in the Piano Invitation Collection.

Sometimes it’s refreshing to hear a simple offertory.  I like to be able to distinguish the melody when hearing an instrumental special. My son, and another gentleman in our church were suppose to play a guitar/harmonica offertory this past Sunday night. Unfortunately, they hadn’t had much time to practice.

They asked if I would play along on the piano with them for support. They wouldn’t be able to practice until Sunday evening before church during the time I had to practice with the vocal special for that night. So…I quickly wrote a simple piano accompaniment that Sunday afternoon and had my daughter-in-law practice with them that evening.  They did great for a last minute ensemble!

Here’s the video of them playing “In the Sweet By and By”.

Click here for free copy of the piano arrangement for this simple offertory  (including melody score for an instrument)

Tip: The accompaniment may also be used to accompany a vocal solo

 I recently composed a congregational piano arrangement of Away in a Manger for one of my upcoming church pianists to play for church while I’m away.

So..I’ll share it with other church pianists that may be able to put it to use this Christmas.

Click here to download Away in a Manger (free congregational piano arrangement)

An upcoming young musician, Joshua Harrison, contacted me a while back  about previewing his piano arrangement book entitled: “Christmas Inspirations”. Joshua’s desire is that the Lord be glorified through his playing which is refreshing to hear…especially from a young gentleman 🙂

The book consists of nine  Christmas carols as follows:

Joy To The World!
Silent Night
Hark! the Herald Angels Sing!
The First Noel
Away In A Manger
O Little Town Of Bethlehem
Angels We Have Heard On High
O Come All Ye Faithful
I Heard the Bells On Christmas Day

Most of the arrangements are a page and a half and a couple are longer  in length…making for a nice collection of short offertories or recital pieces for students.

After clicking on following link…you must click on individual song titles  to hear sample of each song…not the book cover picture.

Click here to listen to audios of Joshua’s book entitled: Christmas Inspirations

Joshua has generously offered to give away one copy of his Christmas book (pdf format).  Simply leave a comment below to enter the drawing.  Leave a separate comment if you share the link to this article on facebook or your personal blog…allowing your name to be entered twice!

The drawing will be held on December 19th, 2011 at 10pm EST

The winner will receive his or her free downloadable pdf copy of “Christmas Inspirations” by email from the author of the book: Joshua Harrsion

I asked my readers to provide the name of an ‘awkward to play’ Christmas carol.  I would then create an article concerning that carol. “Thou Didst Leave Thy Throne” was the most mentioned piece.

Last year, I did an article on this very song but it was for ‘piano solo’ style. Today’s free piano arrangement of “Thou Didst Leave Thy Throne” will be congregational style.

As I was arranging this carol, I had to force myself to stay within the chords “as written”.  I could have added a lot of minor chords to “warm up” the piece but I stayed true to the voice parts 🙂

Due to frequent chord changes, the church pianist will have to play in a more ‘chorale’ (solid chord) style in order to support the ever-changing voice parts.  There is still time to throw in ocasional dress-ups to create a more interesting sound as you will see in today’s free piano arrangement of “Thou Didst Leave Thy Throne”.

Click here to download “Thou Didst Leave Thy Throne” before viewing editor notes below.

Editor notes for “Thou Didst Leave Thy Throne”

General information:

I tried to create smooth harmonic (chord) changes throughout… in spite of the frequent chord changes in this beautiful Christmas carol.

Here and there you’ll see where I deviated from the melody line to create a smoother move for the hands.

Notice how the right hand at the beginning…started with three notes and gradually worked into an octave format.  One of my former piano teachers always taught me to write in a more “user friendly” style for pianists in general…to avoid awkward moves/leaps.  Hopefully, this arrangement will be comfortable and beneficial for other church pianists.  I did keep the early advanced to advanced pianist in mind when creating this arrangement.

Measure #4:

Beat 2 and 3 of right hand is an echo fill-in during the held word “me”

Measure #5:

A sixteenth note improvised pattern on beat 2 is added… to dress-up the melody line and continues through measure 6.

Tip!

Church pianist tip: Learn to analyze other people’s arrangements; applying ‘learned ideas’ to your own playing. Over time, you will develop your own style but you must learn to apply learned ideas as a  springboard to developing your own style.